


Emotional Intelligence

by Filigree



Category: Animaniacs, Blackadder, Pinky & the Brain, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Tick - Fandom, The Venture Bros
Genre: Gen, Low Humor, Sidekicks' Lounge from the Tick, Super Soldier Serum, lab animal torture (not graphic), meta-universe crossovers between too many silly fandoms, will have multiple characters in crack adventures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-31
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-04 14:16:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3071210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Filigree/pseuds/Filigree
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pinky has a different kind of smart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Emotional Intelligence

**Author's Note:**

> This will be crack, infrequently updated, and probably idiotic at best. But it's lived on my hard drive long enough.

Monday evening, Acme Labs

Lab rule one: Lab animals must never, ever talk to the interns or the program directors. The interns would only faint or run away screaming. The directors would either retire quietly to an office to get drunk, or stand over the cages with a peculiar glitter in their eyes. You really wanted to avoid that glitter.

Even though Brain would never believe it, Pinky knew all the rules about Lab Life. Pinky had known many of them well before Brain did. But it was no damn good trying to tell the little guy, because he was just one of those blokes who only learned when the universe smacked him around repeatedly. Hard. Maybe that was why the little guy’s head was so big, all swollen up from fighting the universe…

Yeah, some of the directors were sadistic bastards, but that was okay in the long run. 

Lab rule two: No matter what happened to the lab animals, they’d wake up later healed and whole and starving. There’d be delicious food, soothing words, and cuddles from some of the post-grads, who were far stronger and more adaptable than the interns.

Pinky accepted it all as his due. The little guy whined and snapped at the gentle hands. Pinky and Brain would talk about it later in the night, when all the humans were gone. Pinky remembered the latest incident vividly, so it must have happened just a day or so before. Even without being zapped, memory slipped in the Lab if you weren't careful. Just look at that poor frozen bloke down in Lab Seven, the guy with the steel arm - his brain must be cheese by now.

“They’ve done something to us, Pinky. We may be invulnerable. Immortal!” Brain stood proudly, crooked tail quivering, paws clenched at his sides, dreams of conquest sparkling in his rosy eyes.

Lab rule three: Humans ruled the daytime, or had to be convinced they did. Lab animals ruled at night. Pinky was almost as certain the post-grads knew this, as he was sure the interns and directors didn’t. Sometimes, he was even certain the post-grads worked for a completely different company, for all the delicate sabotage they did whenever they could.

“That’s just the serums and the splicing, Poit! Pretty cool, if you ask me. Post-grads say they’re trying to repeat something that only worked once on a human.”

“Twice,” said the little guy absently, as he paced along the cage front. “Once on Captain America. Once – with limited success, ha! On the Hulk.”

“Cap? The Hulk? The Avengers, Brain? Narf! Us as jolly green giants, hee hee.” And Pinky danced around the cage, imagining a connection between legendary super-heroes and two lowly lab mice. The mirror-polish of the cage's back wall caught and sent back reflections from his blue eyes. Really, his best feature.

The little guy simmered down, watching Pinky’s dance with something Pinky thought was almost close to affection. Then Brain said, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Pinky?”

Now, there were Real Answers to this question, and the Fake Answers that Pinky secretly enjoyed inflicting on his partner in not-quite-captivity. Lab rule twenty-seven (which he would never tell Brain) was that he’d never, ever tell Brain the Real Answers. 

“I think so, Brain, but I don’t think Dean & DeLuca carries a smoked yak meat gift basket this time of year.” That should stall the little guy for a few nanoseconds.

Brain’s face twisted in momentary puzzlement. “I’m pondering that we need to find another way into Avengers Tower and their labs.”

Pinky stopped pirouetting. “Oh, Brainy-wainy, I don’t want to go up against those bloody robots again. We’d a been goners in another minute flat.”

“But we weren’t. And we shan’t. Not if we go about it sideways.”

Pinky turned sideways and walked like an Egyptian. “Fun times, Brain. But how is that gonna get us into Stark’s lab?”

“Banner’s lab,” said Brain, squinting at something triumphant only he could see. “Through the sidekicks. And the Sidekicks’ Lounge.”

Oh, dear, thought Pinky. Meta-universe jumping again. The Avengers didn’t have sidekicks, they just had more heroes. Or lethally smart Artificial Intelligences, scary-smart CEOs with sharp heeled shoes, keenly observant military friends, and as terrifying a collection of Men In Black compatriots as Pinky had ever seen. And in the fair City of New York, one got to see quite a lot…not to mention, the Lounge wasn’t even in the right universe!

He didn’t say any of that aloud, settling for an enthusiastic “Zort!”

It was gonna be a long night.


End file.
